Top Stories

The silicate mineral garnet is mainly used in the industrial abrasive and filtration industries, meaning that its consumption is loosely tied to economic activity, although its niche position protects it to some extent from the vagaries of GDP performance. Raymond Ding, managing director of Chinese garnet producer, Wuxi Ding Long, spoke to IM about the effect China’s economic turbulence is having on this niche mineral and its end markets.

The Chinese government’s efforts to take the heat out of its unsustainable rate of growth was meant to slow down economic expansion, but analysis by the US investment bank suggests that the policies implemented may have had the unintended consequence of pushing some sectors into decline. Minerals and metals commodities are among those expected to be hardest hit, as China’s GDP success story comes down with a bump.

The minerals industry is used to taking its cues from other business areas when it comes to innovative transport solutions. But although mineral logistics have benefitted from this copy-cat approach, increasing demands from its customers mean that it may soon have to take the lead and come up with its own technologies, Bruce McMichael, IM Logistics Correspondent, writes.

Negotiations are underway to revamp the existing free trade agreement between Mexico and the European Union in a deal that will replace that signed in 2000, at a time when the EU has expanded significantly and Mexican production of talc, bentonite and kaolin, among other minerals, is surging.